21st Century Transportation Updates

WASHINGTON (August 23, 2016) –More than 80,000 Americans joined dozens of mayors, business leaders, environmental and consumer groups, and state and city transportation officials in calling on the Obama administration to reduce carbon pollution from the nation’s transportation system and promote cleaner and smarter transportation options that combat climate change.

New federal data from the U.S. Energy and Information Administration (EIA) show that the U.S. transportation sector has produced more carbon pollution than any other sector of the economy over the last 12 months, including the electric power, industrial, residential, and commercial sectors. The results mark the first time that carbon emissions from the transportation sector have exceeded emissions from each of the other sectors since 1979.

Two highway projects, representative of some of the worst such projects in the nation, received the nod from officials recently. If you’re a fan of wasteful, outdated highway expansion projects that cannibalize scarce transportation dollars, then it was a good week. But if you care about the concerns of local communities, fiscal responsibility, public health, the environment, and giving people more and better mobility options in America, the support for these highway projects was unwelcome news.

In the early hours of last Thursday morning, the Hillsborough County local Metropolitan Planning Organization approved the Tampa Bay Expressway project (TBX), clearing the way for the Florida Department of Transportation to move forward with the controversial highway expansion plan. The decision adds Florida to a growing list of states that are pushing forward with wasteful highway boondoggles slated to cost billions.

For many, when they think of combating global warming, they think of solar panels on rooftops and eliminating coal fired power plants. But, the truth is, there is not an effective solution to address global warming that does not deal with transportation as well.

For many, a world without carbon pollution seems like a distant utopia. To some, this even seems unobtainable. The size and scope of the challenge before us can be daunting, yet, there is good news -- a world without carbon pollution is closer than you think.

Despite news stories claiming that Millennials are buying up cars at record rates, the reality is quite different. After adjusting previous studies to account for differences in the size of the generations measured, on a per-capita basis, Millennials are 29 percent less likely than members of Generation X to own a car.

A new survey by Politico Magazine of U.S. mayors has found that 1 in 3 mayors believe that underinvestment in infrastructure is putting lives at risk, and a plurality of mayors, some 40 percent, believe that that transportation and infrastructure should be the next administration’s highest urban priority.